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A little good news on the horizon - Ryujo sank, and it seems Junyo sank as well. S 38 sank an enemy transport and cost Raver some base force troops at Buna - and then next turn she smacked a torp into an AV in the same spot.

Raver bombed cooktown - no real damage so not really worried. Will move some AA in there sooner or later though.

S-38 put ANOTHER torp into the AV at Buna - she should sink now.

All I have to do is sink 1700 points of enemy shipping without loosing any of my own and Raver and I will be even again

Of course, subs are my best weapon now. I'm going to use these war winning weapons to hunt his transports down to win the war of supply and starve his troops at the front line.

More consolation news as two IJN subs are bombed and hit in Noumea harbour by my extremely effective b17 asw group. S-38 is out of torps, and so is Greenling so I'm pulling them both out of the Buna area wehre they've had such good hunting.

Luskan wrote:More consolation news as two IJN subs are bombed and hit in Noumea harbour by my extremely effective b17 asw group. S-38 is out of torps, and so is Greenling so I'm pulling them both out of the Buna area wehre they've had such good hunting.

Enjoy the hunt while you can...........there is a storm coming with a blood red sun rising behind it !

Raverdave wrote:Enjoy the hunt while you can...........there is a storm coming with a blood red sun rising behind it !

How poetic! :sleep: :p

Doesn't even rhyme!

Any minute now Raver is going to have to post the results of the next turn. All the men in my HQ have been ordered to hold their breath AND cross their fingers to make sure that the slap dash, make shift, unplanned and generally half-assed mission designated Operation Hail Mary comes off without a hitch. Or at least doesn't cost me any more heavy losses.

Loads of transports flooding into the theatre. Can't I just get a few welders to glue two APs end to end and nail a big of nice south east asian wood between them to make an extremely long and servicable flight deck (not to mention the fact that this super long vessel would now have two engines, and a bi-compartmentalised hull making her extra tough.

If that works, I should get them to glue a second end to end joined pair of APs onto their side to create a massively wide AND long new CV with 4 hulls, 4 engines (although you'd need to do some fancy engineering to get the front two AP's props to work underneath the hulls of the rear two bows.

If the whole welding them together isn't feasable, surely I could train two AP captains to sail their converted ships in a line astern formation where the gap between the rear ship (with all the planes sitting on its deck) and the front ship was easily and temporarily bridged by a few bits of wood tied on with a bit of hemp rope etc. Planes would launch across the length of two AP decks (converted to be flat flight decks of course) and take off. They could land the same way.

Someone will know if the length of two APs end to end is a long enough runway for CV borne aircraft.


Will this feature called "Luskan's Brilliant CV Engineering" be an enable/disable optoin in WITP?
Will Operation Hail Mary be a disaster of biblical proportion?
Will the Wallabies win the world cup?
Will the rumour about Salman Rushdie, Harold Holt and Elvis all living together in a Perth Apartment in secret turn out to be true???

For the answers to some of these questions, stay tuned for the next post!

Operation Hail Mary is a resounding success!!!!!!!! Oz Force's top secret mission was brilliantly planned and executed. Tempted to go back into Buna and hit raver's transports again, but his CVs are no doubt nearby coming to try and catch me if he can etc.

Better than expected in fact!

Just nice to remind Raver what a nasty opponent I am to underestimate!

5 DDs, 3 APs, 500 troops, and a damaged AV for no hits in return.

AFTER ACTION REPORTS FOR 08/23/42

Weather: Partly Cloudy

Night Time Surface Combat, near Buna at 12,38

Japanese Ships
DD Shigure, Shell hits 15, Torpedo hits 1, and is sunk
DD Usugumo, Shell hits 17, and is sunk
AP Kamishima Maru
AP Kano Maru
AP Kasuga Maru #2
AP Kenryu Maru
AP Manju Maru, Shell hits 30, on fire, heavy damage
AP Mikage Maru #20
AP Muko Maru
AP Sakido Maru, Shell hits 18, and is sunk
AP Sanko Maru
AP Shinko Maru, Shell hits 21, and is sunk

Allied Ships
CA Chicago
CA Salt Lake City
CA New Orleans
CA Quincy
CL Achillies
CL Hobart
CL Phoenix
DD Meredith
DD Swanson
DD Gwin
DD Walke
DD Perkins
DD Preston
DD Dunlap
DD Fanning
DD Dewey
DD Worden
DD Aylwin

Japanese ground losses:
Men lost 466
Guns lost 6


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Night Time Surface Combat at 0,0

Japanese Ships
AV Kamikawa Maru, Shell hits 12, Torpedo hits 2, and is sunk
DD Yugure, Shell hits 50, and is sunk
DD Amagiri, Shell hits 30, and is sunk

Allied Ships
CA Chicago
CA Salt Lake City
CA New Orleans
CA Quincy
CL Achillies
CL Hobart
CL Phoenix
DD Meredith
DD Swanson
DD Gwin
DD Walke
DD Perkins
DD Preston
DD Dunlap
DD Fanning
DD Dewey
DD Worden
DD Aylwin


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Ground combat at Woodlark Island

Japanese Shock attack

Attacking force 665 troops, 4 guns, 0 vehicles

Defending force 0 troops, 0 guns, 0 vehicles

Japanese assault odds: 10 to 1 (fort level 0)

Japanese forces CAPTURE Woodlark Island base !!!



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Nothing much to report - Tautog fired her stern tubes and blasted one of Raver's PCs back to the stone age at Lunga, but that is about all.

I'm guessing that I've probably got about a month before Raver's autovictory plan starts rolling.

Several top secret operations are in planning, and several not so secret ops are underway as well. Mining luganville with everything I've got is top priority at the moment. Shoving a few extra troops into Efate too. Glad to have two marine divisions to back up the americal troops.

Japanese LRB every bit as good as the Allies LRB when used correctly !

Cop a look at the CR.

AFTER ACTION REPORTS FOR 08/31/42

Weather: Partly Cloudy

Air attack on Cairns , at 7,56

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 54

no losses


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Air attack on Cooktown , at 6,53

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 48
G3M Nell x 93
G4M1 Betty x 181

Allied aircraft
P-40E Kittyhawk x 21

Japanese aircraft losses
G4M1 Betty x 3 damaged

Allied aircraft losses
P-40E Kittyhawk x 2 destroyed
B-25D Mitchell x 3 destroyed
B-25D Mitchell x 4 damaged
Hudson x 1 destroyed
Hudson x 1 damaged

SLDR L. Jackson of No. 75 Sqn RAAF bails out and is RESCUED


Allied ground losses:
Men lost 107

Airbase hits 61
Airbase supply hits 5
Runway hits 176

Attacking Level Bombers:
15 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
6 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
6 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
15 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
7 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
5 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
9 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
7 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
7 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
4 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
15 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
11 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
8 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
4 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
6 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
10 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
8 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
9 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
13 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
10 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
5 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet
5 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
4 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
15 x G4M1 Betty at 1000 feet
13 x G3M Nell at 1000 feet

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Air attack on Cairns , at 7,56

Japanese aircraft
A6M2 Zero x 50

no losses


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Hells bells man - no regard at all for AAA - flying your bombers in at 1000 feet. Is there no AAA assets at Cooktown?

Just save some APs Raver you will still need them at the end of the game

Well, that is my strategy - catch Raver's APs at every chance - even if it means a daring Truk raid or two.

To combat the barge problem will be more difficult - beaufighters just don't have the range to catch barges behind the lines, and they don't cut it when expert zeroes swoop down on them. I've got a few ideas - but nothing really brilliant just yet. See if I can't come up with preventing the autovictory first (actually not too worried about it - lots of troops and LBA arriving, and now I've got a couple of BBs to mess up invasions I think I'm cool for the time being).

I get the feeling that the game after Raver's autovictory attempt will swing on how efficient he is with his engineers and his base forces.

Bullshit !

Well, Raver's troops took Wupenko without a fight, but that won't last.
His lrb paid another visit to Cooktown, only this time there were no fighter escorts, and 33 P-40s of the RAAF there to ruin his day. 8 nells and 12 betties didn't return home (out of 150 so not brilliant, but good enough).

Well, the RAAF's success made Raver stop his bombings at Cooktown - and as a result, Cooktown was able to hit back at him.

10 mitchells launched at Buna and scored a hit on one of his APs unloading there. Wasn't a brilliant result, but just a sign of things to come.

In other more important news, Operation Pestilence kicked off with fast transport groups dumping a brigade of the 2nd Marine division on the beach at Wupenko to kick Raver's invaders into the ocean before they get an idea to set up shop permanently.

S-40 puts 2 torps and half a dozen shells through one of Raver's many tankers at Lunga. Lots of activity there, I'm guessing that the fuel transports haven't moved enough there for Raver's BBs to set up shop there just yet, but probably not too long before Raver starts to flex his BBs on a few bombardment runs (since he knows my CVs won't be intercepting them on the way home!).

The tanker I had S-40 hit at Lunga went down. Lee and Yank force were spotted on their way into mess Raver's transports up at Lunga, but they were spotted on the way in, Raver moved heaps of BBs into Lunga to wait for them so I called it off. Pity, because if I could just connect a surface combat group with his mass tanker tf, I could make Raver's fuel supply issues go from difficult (as is normal for the IJN) to impossible, which would hopefully curtail pretty much all offensive ops for his BBs and CVs further forward.

As it is, he's probably moved enough fuel by now to base his fleet at shortlands and lunga without fear of running out.

My surface fleet got smacked on a similar try at Buna - only lost 1 dd, but Raver's subs are camped off the aussie coast to catch the crippled ships that are going to have to limp home to Noumea.

Well I sent my LRB ( 241 Nells and Bettys) to Cairns, but instead of hitting the airfield which I have been doing so far, I decided to hit the port. Caught some nice fat ships with their arses tied to the piers !

The fact that I have to collect my escort as I head towards the target is problematic, as the weather sometimes grounds the fighters, as was the case with this mission.............but guess what........not a single fighter rose to meet my bombers ! (Just as well !).

AFTER ACTION REPORTS FOR 09/17/42

Weather: Partly Cloudy

Air attack on Cairns , at 7,56

Japanese aircraft
G3M Nell x 80
G4M1 Betty x 161

Japanese aircraft losses
G4M1 Betty x 1 destroyed
G4M1 Betty x 2 damaged

Allied Ships
CL Phoenix, Bomb hits 4, on fire, heavy damage
CL Achillies, Bomb hits 4, on fire, heavy damage
CA Quincy, Bomb hits 3, on fire
CL Hobart, Bomb hits 4, on fire, heavy damage
CA New Orleans, Bomb hits 3, on fire


Allied ground losses:
Men lost 54

Port hits 14
Port fuel hits 9
Port supply hits 1

Attacking Level Bombers:
3 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
5 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet
9 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
4 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet
5 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet
27 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
4 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
4 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
19 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
13 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet
15 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
6 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
11 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
3 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet
13 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet
15 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
16 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet
15 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
9 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
6 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
6 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
3 x G4M1 Betty at 6000 feet
11 x G3M Nell at 6000 feet

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A very good result indeed !

Plenty of bomb hits, but they were small bombs, and none of the ships is in any danger of sinking - hardly any new damage at all in fact.

I should have seen it coming though.

Just had some good luck vs Crocky, and swapped 100 usn cv aircraft for two of his cvs and two cvls without his cvs ever launching (or even spotting) against my 25 ship surface group 2 hexes from them, or my 6 cv group 5 hexes from them (instead crocky's planes sank 3 apds about 7 hexes away). His spotter planes did poorly.
To sum up: an Aussie just got a few Kiwi scalps.
Probably an omen for the rugby world cup !

That's going to be bloody hard when you get knocked out in the round robin

Well things as some what slow at this point...two turns have come and gone since my air raid on Cairns. I now note that Luskan has LOTS of CAP flying there LOL.

I am still mulling over what my next move should be. At this point I am just happy to snipe at any targets that pop up, but there are very few of those, as Luskan is being a mother hen to all of his ships.

Some interesting activity has been spotted at Luganville.....I would expect his LRB to start launching from there very soon, if not the next turn.


Hey Wobbly....bugger off !